Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 4.djvu/117

Rh and of singular perseverance and energy in the pursuit of his fa- vourite science : he was a very lucid and agreeable writer, and it would be difficult to name any other cotemporary author in this or other countries who has made such important additions to our knowledge of horticulture and the economy of vegetation.

Sir Richard Colt Hoare, the owner of the beautiful domain of Stourhead in Wiltshire, was the author of many valuable historical and topographical works, and more especially of the history of his native county, presenting so numerous and such splendid funereal and other monuments of the primitive inhabitants of Great Britain, which he investigated with a perseverance and success unrivalled by any other antiquary. The early possession of an ample fortune and of all the luxuries of his noble residence, seem to have stimu- lated, rather than checked, the more ardent pursuit of those favourite studies, which occupied his almost exclusive attention for more than fifty years of his life : and he was at all times, both by his co-operation and patronage, ready to aid other labourers in the same field which he had himself cultivated with so much success and industry.

Sir Richard Hoare was a very voluminous original author, and on a great variety of subjects ; he printed a catalogue of his unique collection of books relating to the history and topography of Italy, the whole of which he presented to the British Museum, to which he was, on other occasions, a liberal benefactor. He likewise pub- lished editions of many of our ancient chronicles ; and it is only to be lamented that one who has contributed under so many forms to our knowledge of antiquity, and who presents so many claims to the grateful commemoration of the friends of literature and the arts, should have been influenced so much, and so frequently, by the very unhappy ambition, of which some well-known and di- stinguished literary bodies of our own time have set so unworthy an example, of giving an artificial value to their publications, by the extreme smallness of the number of copies which they allow to be printed or circulated ; thus defeating the very objects of that great invention, whose triumphs were pretended to be the very ground- work of their association.

Mr. George Hibbert was one of the most distinguished of those princely merchants whose knowledge of literature, patronage of the arts, and extensive intercourse Avith the world have contributed so much, in, a great commercial country like our own, to elevate the rank and character of the class to which they belong, and to give to the pursuits of wealth an enlarged and liberalizing spirit. Mr. Hib- bert possessed, during the most active period of his life, an uncom- mon influence amongst the great commercial bodies of the me- tropolis, and more particularly amongst those connected with the West India trade, from his integrity and high character, his great knowledge of business, his excellent sense and judgement, and his clearness and readiness in public speaking. He was an excellent bo- tanist, and the collection of plants which he had formed at his resi- dence at Clapham, was remarkable not merely for its great extent, but likewise for the great number of extremely rare plants which it con-